


Cruelty

by Townycod13



Category: Discworld - Terry Pratchett
Genre: F/M, M/M, needless angst, sybil is best, vetinari is being a whiney baby
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-18
Updated: 2018-01-18
Packaged: 2019-03-06 06:51:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,373
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13405764
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Townycod13/pseuds/Townycod13
Summary: Havelock Vetinari makes three mistakes.(luckily problem solving is a valuable skill in a city like this)





	Cruelty

Can cruelty really be measured in any truly meaningful function? Truthfully, there’s no appropriate answer to that, as with most subjective items in existence, cruelty is among the long list of things that are difficult to measure and harder yet to define.

 

Those with more time and less thoughts usually had an easy time of it. Simple distinctions as clear as the muddied concepts of ‘right' and ‘wrong’. Who can say if they are wrong for that simplicity, they get the job done effectively.

 

Of course there are those that don’t bother to measure it, simple continue with the job at hand without mind for the implications and pain left in their wake.

 

Then there are those that don’t bother to define but also do put significant thought into the measurement of cruelty, what could be too much? Too little? To what degree can this tool be used most effectively?

 

As with methods of measurement, cruelty itself had a wide range of interpretations. From ‘an unthinkable thing’ to a ‘useful tool’ and from time to time a curse and a cry.

 

Where exactly did Lord Vetinari fit on this scale? He couldn’t quite say, but he could also say with quiet and deadly precision. He was aware, of course, that beliefs were frequently not the basis for speech to most people in his position and if one did not benefit him he could choose to avoid it.

 

Despite this though, he found that he was not much of a liar. Silence and lies by omission were an entirely different item, but he tended to avoid the outright lie.

 

He could make quite a few fair arguments that the more pronounced a lie is the more likely it is to become a hindrance in the long run but truly, that wasn’t his strongest motivation for avoiding untruths.

 

Somewhere in the back of his soul, the bit he chose to listen to quietly over tea but only indulged in little ways that could benefit the bigger picture, there was a side of him that found lies to just be cruel.

 

He could do them. Fair enough and easy enough. It wasn’t a difficult skill but something always protested of the cruelty of it.

 

For a man that had done quite a few unarguably evil things in his life-time, even ignoring a more grey definition of the word, it was strange for him to acknowledge that there was something in him that hesitated at the thought of cruelty.

 

Hesitation was the problem in his current situation of course. He was normally quite prepared to lie thoughtlessly if necessary, even though he would quite prefer to avoid it, but he had in that moment chosen to lie and then a moment later and before he could force the words out of his lips, there was a dreadful hesitation.

 

It was humiliating. It was mortifying. But worst of all it was a weakness. He knew that the woman before him was as likely to use it against him as she was to completely let it pass by. Lady Sybil was a strong and dignified woman that had her own moral compass that had thus far rarely led her wrong.

 

It was always people like that, the ones that knew precisely who they were and held strength from that, those fascinating individuals that could be a bit troublesome to predict even if their actions were akin to predestined.

 

He could hope and wish and pray that the kind woman before him had missed the moment of hesitation but he knew that would be too much and besides, he wasn’t much of the hoping sort. He was the sort that found his problems and solved them. With a resolve he couldn’t even snap himself.

 

He’d tried to defeat himself, on and off, to see if it was possible but he found that he posed a greater challenge than he’d care to indulge in at his age.

 

Still, it was a good exercise to identify and recognize his own weaknesses.

 

It was strange that with all that preparation he had let a seemingly harmless noblewoman grasp a weakness with that vice-grip that she used to raise her dragons.

 

He had great admiration for Lady Sybil but in this moment, despite his own shame and rage, he felt a respect he’d not soon let go of. Well played, my lady, you have my attention.

 

One thing that he could maybe place some hope in was that she would not doggedly pursue the weakness she had uncovered or maybe spare them by acknowledging that the facts in this matter did one of them any good.

 

She knew him as well as anyone really could and she ought to be well aware that whatever the truth in this matter was, he wouldn’t do anything in this particular matter.

 

After all, if nothing else, if he was going to do something about his unfortunate little weakness, he would have done something ages ago. They both had to be aware of it.

 

This too of course would be too much to hope for though. She was not the sort to let something like this go. He knew her that well, at least.

 

The duchess sipped her tea thoughtfully and observed his blank expression. He knew he was a master of hiding his thoughts, but all the same he felt uncomfortably naked under her stare. He imagined she must stare down uncooperative dragons like this from time to time. He felt somewhat sorry for the creatures.

 

He wouldn’t wish that stare upon any freedom loving creature, it locked you down, held you in place, and sternly established the rule that the next one to speak would be her.

 

Vetinari knew he could return the stare with equal intensity, but it was usually not in the best interest of the tactically savvy to blindly establish dominance when negotiation was still potentially on the table.

 

Negotiation for what? He supposed his greatest wish was for the realizations within this conversation to remain between the two of them. No, that would be a lie, but one he was more comfortable with.

 

There are, after all, differences between lies and decisions. If something is not in fact and fact yet, but he was of the mind to turn it into one, he considered it a promise rather than a lie.

 

And Lord Vetinari did make a point to keep his promises.

 

If he had decided that the most important matter to him was secrecy of this delicate matter, that that was in fact what was most important to him, and he would make it so even if he had to defeat himself to do it.

 

He was, in some ways, stubborn to a fault. _it was fortunate that few people had the mind to tackle those aspects of him, as pride was ant an issue with him.

 

Many associated stubborn with pride, and it led to them missing the mark by a margin.

 

Lady Sybil, the duchess of Ankh-Morpork, cleared her throat. Looking thoughtful for just a moment, as if re-considering her question and his delayed answer, she finally spoke again after what felt like a small eternity.

 

It was a fruitful eternity though, Vetinari had taken the time to find and isolate the weaknesses that had led him to this position. By morning he would destroy them.

 

“Is that so.” She said finally.

 

It was not a question.

 

Vetinari interlaced his fingers, she wasn’t commenting on his lie or hesitation, but rather choosing to proceed with the conversation. It felt somewhat unfair that it took away any opportunity he had to explain himself, to defend himself, to explain to her that he-

 

That was a pointless process of thought, he knew, he wasn’t the sort o respond in that way to accusations.

 

Lady Sybil’s face read with absolute certainty, as if this were a game of thud and she had just employed a particularly clever tactic ‘your move’. She wasn’t really wrong. It was a response that left him little recourse.

 

Backing out of the lie now would show a larger weakness that he wasn’t terribly confident in but continuing to bury the truth in cement would only assure her that she had indeed gained the upper hand. There was always a third option, somewhere between a truth and a lie, the place that Vetinari preferred to lay his head at night.

 

The gray area that enabled him to be truly invisible at night and oddly, within conversation.

 

Was it appropriate though? Despite all his desires to the contrary, this was not actually a conversation of politics. In politics, his words both danced and stood. Firm but smooth. He could get anything done, should it be a necessity.

 

This, unfortunately, was personal.

 

Even if the contents of the conversation itself wasn’t of terribly personal content, Lady Sybil was not a political company. True, Vetinari did not really have things that others referred to as friends, not in the way most people did at least, but he did have those that he could consider… personal.

 

Lady Sybil was one such individual. She wasn’t useless to his political purposes, being an influential duchess and wife of the duke of Ankh-Morpork, sir Samuel Vimes, his grace the commander of the watch.

 

But that was part of the problem.

 

He didn’t meet with her in these little tea parties for power or influence. He found them nice. This, without the tension that currently hung over the two, was nice.

 

She was nice.

 

She was personal.

 

Her husband, sir Samual, was not.

 

He wasn’t political either, at least not in the usual ways and he wasn’t quite a pawn either.

 

That was probably the trouble.

 

Vetinari had always had a soft spot for things he couldn’t quite label. It gave them an extra interest that his attention sometimes needed to help his thoughts dance properly.

 

He’d, foolishly, considered this to be relatively harmless though. There wasn’t a single thing he would do in any reality to adjust the status quo in any way that wasn’t purely manufactured to assist his city.

 

The machine must work.

 

Lady Sybil was patient but he was still considering the great many options before him.

 

How to explain to her or preferably, not to.

 

He had decided, finally, when the lady before him raised her hand to silence the unspoken words. He felt uneasy, like she had seen his internal struggle, decision, and disapproved.

 

“Really, Havelock, there’s no need to look that distressed,” he could have huffed at the accusation, he’d known for a fact that none of his troubled thoughts had leaked onto his face, “I’ve known for years.”

 

That was possibly more upsetting. He was sure that he’d been careful. It was true that Sybil was in a unique position to have insights on the situation and an unusually close connection to him, as well as being a rather observant woman, but he still felt he should have ben able to keep it under lock and key.

 

That did raise a new question though, “Then, I must enquire, why are you asking now? Is there something in particular that spurred this on?”

 

Lady Sybil hummed not unkindly, but not terribly kindly, “I’ve been thinking a lot lately. It was something that caught my musings and I thought it was about time to change know into a shared fact.”

 

Vetinari very pointedly did not stiffen, it seemed that while Sybil did not share his talent for lying she certainly had less of an aversion to it.

 

It was rather unfortunate that she had all the cards in this situation. He had a few as well, if he was honest with himself, but none that he was willing to use. Not when in his mind, in this situation, to this person, he was in all likeliness something of a villain.

 

He wasn’t opposed to being a villain or a tyrant on his own terms. It was when it was something he was quite opposed to that he found discomfort.

 

In the same way that they should both be aware there was nothing he would or could do to take Sybil’s husband away from her, they were also both aware that Havelock’s true talent was getting precisely what he wanted regardless of the odds, should he choose to pursue it.

 

The same way that the commander of the watch was quite capable of arresting anyone or anything he deemed to have broken the law.

 

Lady Sybil kept company with some quite headstrong individuals. It was rather fortunate for her that she was rather difficult to bend as well, in her own ways.

 

Vetinari was well aware of this, as he was with most things, and found that it made her a rather difficult person to predict.

 

He was sure he could spin a web to catch her in a trap that would guide her hands like a marionettes. That lacked a certain interest though.

 

Despite his better judgment, Vetinari rather enjoyed the individuals he couldn’t or wouldn’t quite pin down. In some cases, more than he would like.

 

Again, that was the problem at hand, wasn’t it?

 

Lady Sybil sipped her tea delicately, ever the lady, and smiled bemusedly at the stony face of the patrician in such a way that it even looked as though she was also amusing herself with the veiled panic beneath.

 

Enough was enough he supposed, the only way to truly prove his intent was to behave in the way appropriate of his position.

 

Distance, confidence, strength, and tyranny. The only thing to do was to separate Sybil from personal.

 

Because this was Important.

 

She was important. Her family was important. Her son was important Her husband was important.

 

Vetinari had something of a policy when it came to Important. Personal didn’t really feed into it at all. At least not in the ways that most would think.

 

He breathed in, perhaps a bit heavier than he’d intended, and proceeded to shut Sybil Vimes out of his life with a smooth smile, a cool voice, and an entirely too dismissively dishonest web.

 

She hadn’t done a thing to earn this cruelty but some things are Important.


End file.
